Deconstructing Trust

“It’s a trust issue.” At some point in the course of tackling a challenge, we often name part of the issue as trust—or to be more precise, the lack thereof. Almost always, when I’m coaching and my client names trust as an issue, I ask them to dig deeper, to articulate a more nuanced understanding of what “not trusting” means. What I offer at that point are several distinctions that create language for “digging deeper.” Deconstructing the “trust issue” using these distinctions as a guide can create a path towards identifying practical and meaningful actions that can enable us to address breakdowns and, very often, restore trust.

My understanding of trust has been informed by the work of Fernando Flores ( Building trust in Business, Politics, Relationships, and Life) and Charles Feltman (The Thin Book of Trust.) If you find this post intriguing, I heartily recommend each of these slim but potent books.

Simple, Blind and Authentic Trust

The first and most essential shift that we need to make to begin to address trust breakdowns is to recognize that restoring trust is an option. For many, if not most, people trust is something that you have or don’t. Working on trust requires that we shift from understanding trust as a noun to experiencing trust as a verb. Trust is not a thing, but a set of actions.

In Flores’ words:

“Trust is an option, a choice. It is an active part of our lives, not something that has to be there from the beginning, or that can be taken for granted. It involves skills and commitment, not just good luck or mutual understanding.”

“Trust is not a medium but a human virtue, cultivated through speech, conversation, commitments, and action.”

Going even further, Flores likens trust to love (also best understood as a verb):

“Trust, like love, is an emotional skill, an ongoing, dynamic aspect of relationships.”

He then distinguishes between three different types of trust—simple, authentic, and blind:

Simple Trust is what we typically think of as trust—it’s generally unthinking and unreflective. It lacks the possibility of distrust. Flores suggests that simple trust is, in fact, inattention or taking trust for granted—treating trust as a “thing.” He suggests that “it is a tragic mistake to take simple trust as the ideal of trust and to suppose that the loss of simple trust is itself a tragedy or a disaster.”  According to Flores “loss of simple trust, the end of that naïve transparency, is an invitation to reflection and understanding, the beginnings of wisdom.” And, conversely, treating trust as static means that: “It easily breaks, and, once broken, cannot be mended. We speak of trust being ‘shattered” and “destroyed.’ “

Authentic Trust is what we want to be working towards in the relationships that matter to us. It is built on a foundation of awareness, understanding, and vulnerability. Authentic trust involves a recognition of the risks and uncertainties inherent in trust, and still choosing to trust. It requires connection, communication, and shared values. Authentic trust is the space in which trust becomes a verb and working on trust on ongoing pursuit. Flores goes so far as to say that authentic trust can only truly exist when simple trust is broken, and trust needs to be rebuilt. While I found that challenging at first, when I inventoried the trusting relationships in my life, it was largely true. When we can embrace the possibility of authentic trust, we can actually feel a sense of relief and possibility—trust is restorable, it is more flexible and workable than a view of trust as a noun or “thing” allows.

Lastly—and briefly—Blind Trust is the trust that is placed in someone or something without critical evaluation or discernment—even when there is evidence that that trust should not be afforded. It involves placing complete reliance on others without questioning their intentions, capabilities, or credibility. Blind trust may be based on assumptions, naivety, or wishful thinking rather than evidence or rational judgment. In Flores’ words: “It has been presented with evidence for distrust, but it not only rejects such evidence, it denies it.” (Think for a moment of the harm that has been done in the world because of blind trust.)

Creating Authentic Trust

Authentic trust requires that we cultivate the skill of creating impeccable commitments and promises and diligently managing those commitments. When we do this well, we set up the conditions for trust. This is intentional, conscious, and ongoing work. Authentic trust also requires that we don’t take the relationships that matter most to us for granted—assuming that they will always be trusting relationships regardless of what we do or don’t do.

[We build authentic trust through] self-scrutiny, caring about the long-term relationship and not just the outcome, negotiation and mutual understanding, a willingness to make and stand by one’s own commitments, a keen awareness of the risks and liabilities, and the recognition that taking on these risks and liabilities is above all one’s own responsibility. (Flores, Solomon)

Dimensions of Trust

Charles Feltman, in his The Thin Book of Trust builds on Flores’ work and offers framework I have found especially useful and practical. First, Feltman defines trust as choosing to risk making something you value vulnerable to another person’s actions. It took me several readings to take that in—so let me offer a simple example:

My daughter and I cook together often—especially for Jewish holidays. It took me years to entrust her with a whole recipe and not look over her shoulder. It’s important to me that our holiday tables be filled with food that meets a certain aesthetic and taste standard. Suggesting that she takes on a whole recipe—not just work under my tutelage and guidance—wasn’t easy for me. It required that I choose to make the experience of our holiday meals vulnerable to her actions.

Conversely, distrust is a choice not to make yourself vulnerable to another person’s actions. It is a general assessment that what is important to me is not safe with this person, at least in this situation. For example, while I deeply trust my husband in many domains, I don’t entrust him with preparing food for a holiday. More on that soon.

Feltman then offers that the choice to trust is made up of a set of distinct assessments around four different dimensions:  sincerity, reliability, competence, and care. Considering someone fully trustworthy requires that we assess that person as meeting all of these dimensions. Using these dimensions is a way to better understand where trust is breaking down and what conversations we need to begin to have to rebuild trust.

Let’s quickly define these dimensions and then we’ll look at my cooking example using these assessments:

Sincerity: I trust your authenticity, honesty, and the genuineness of your words and actions.

Reliability: I trust your consistency, dependability, and ability to follow through on commitments and promises.

Competence: I trust your skills, expertise, knowledge, and ability to perform tasks or fulfill responsibilities effectively in the relevant domain.

Care: I trust that you have the requisite concern, empathy, and consideration for the well-being and interests of others.

My assessment of my husband and daughter is that they are both sincere and reliable when it comes to their household commitments. If they say they will be there, they will. They are honest and genuine in their interactions. I try to do the same—it’s one of the things that makes life in our house workable.

However, I don’t trust my husband’s competence in the kitchen and, in the space of food preparation our levels of care are not in alignment. His concern and consideration for how the food will look and taste does not match mine—and he’s not motivated to get better at this. It’s not something he values. My daughter has both developed competence (she watched the Food Channel from age 3 just for fun!) and we have a shared care for the aesthetics of food.

In this case, simply having these distinctions helped me feel less resentful—if he just doesn’t care as much as I do it’s ok. There are so many other, more important, areas where I do fully trust him. And, I am able to recognize that not trusting him here is based on very particular assessments, not a global assessment of his trustworthiness. Similarly, recognizing that I do trust my daughter in all of these dimensions allows me to relinquish any remnants of control and have her become a partner in the kitchen, not my sous chef.

By understanding these dimensions, I can also have more effective conversations. Instead of telling my husband “I don’t trust you in the kitchen,” I can talk to him about what I do trust and what I don’t, and we can better determine where he steps in and where he steps out and what, if this were important to him, he’d need to do to be considered trustworthy by me—we could even negotiate that.

This example has its limitations, I know. What if the thing I don’t trust is at the core of the work a person does—or impedes you from doing your work? What if it’s preventing your ability to delegate to a person on your team? Using these distinctions enables conversations that explore these breakdowns in meaningful ways. You can share and test your assessments and perhaps elicit assessments that person has of you. Often a trust issue works in two directions. This is a powerful way to make that conversation safe. We can discover what we’re each missing in our understanding of ourselves and our impact, and of each other. Often, having these conversations creates a path from something feeling unworkable to being workable. It can also help us highlight that a particular role is not a fit—without demonizing the person who is not “fitting.”

Being Trustworthy

A powerful inquiry we can be in, as we consider ourselves as leaders, is around our own trustworthiness. To what extent are we sincere, reliable, competent, and caring? Looking at yourself through these dimensions can be instructive—pushing us beyond our natural bias towards seeing our intentions rather than understanding our impact (and doing the opposite with others.)

I was first introduced to the dimensions of trust as a participant in a leadership development program. I was attending a weeklong retreat that included a workshop by Coach Mark Robertson on “Building a Culture of Commitment and Accountability,” grounded in Flores and Feltman’s work. I approached Coach Mark to get his advice about my team continuing to interrupt me when I was spending a week offsite. My trust in them being able to operate without me was diminished. Instead of commiserating with me, he asked me to look at my own trustworthiness. He pointed out to me that I had an out-of-office reminder saying I would not be checking e-mail but was, in fact, checking e-mail and responding to people. Wasn’t it me who was not being trustworthy in this particular instance? I was not being reliable about being offline. Why wouldn’t my team reach out to me? I was responding to things that weren’t urgent or emergencies—I wasn’t being true to my word.

Using the four dimensions helped me shift my behavior to be more trustworthy and then let me create the space for my team to show me that they could operate without me, thus increasing my trust in them. The willingness to honestly look at yourself and assess your own trustworthiness—or ask others for their assessments—can be a powerful act of leadership.

Concluding Thoughts

Trust is a loaded word for many of us. By deconstructing it, and especially by using the four dimensions to frame our conversations, we can move away from trust as a moral assessment towards trust as a set of behaviors that we can talk about. We can address the behaviors that need to shift to gain authentic trust, or we can determine that we need to make a change because we can’t hit all the criteria needed to create trust.

Using this framework is one way to make tough conversations more accessible. We avoid generalities (I don’t trust you) and get into specific and useful assessments that can lead to deeper understanding and concrete actions.

Take a few minutes to consider relationships where trust is strong and ones where there’s something preventing full trust. See where the breakdowns are and consider what conversations to initiate to begin to address those breakdowns. And don’t forget to look in the mirror—chances are there’s something there to see.